“The Toyota subsequently caught fire after the collision. The male driver and lone occupant of the Porsche has been transported to hospital with non-life-threatening injuries. The male driver and sole occupant of the Toyota was pronounced deceased at scene,” a news release issued just before 2 p.m. states.

Police were alerted to the incident at approximately 11:30 a.m.

A tweet posted shortly after 11:30 a.m. by a traveller shows flames and thick smoke on the Canadian side of Peace Arch Park, not far from the monument.

PAN reporter Aaron Hinks described seeing two vehicles, apparently crossover-types, in a “t-bone position” in the garden, approximately 30 feet east of new totem pole.

A number of witnesses said they are too shaken to speak to media, however, one reported hearing at least five “explosions,” Hinks said from the scene.

“Lots of smoke and then saw flames, then more explosions, then more flames,” the witness told Hinks.

The witness also reported seeing one person taken from the scene in handcuffs.

A gardener told Blaine, Wash. newspaper The Northern Light that he was in the greenspace when the incident occurred, but escaped injury.

“When I saw he wasn’t going to stop, I ran behind the bushes. At that point, the van just burst into flames,” Mitchell Gerhardt said.

Mitchell Gerhardt, 25, of Surrey, B.C. was working in the flower bed when the crash occurred. A car came barreling in at full speed from the US border, he said. “When I saw he wasn’t going to stop, I ran behind the bushes. At that point the van just burst into flames.”